Prime Minister Ranil Wickremesinghe stated that the Palaly airport in Jaffna, will be developed as a “regional airport,” to serve not only Sri Lanka, but also South India.

India has been pressing for the development of Palaly as an international airport to improve communication links between Tamil-speaking North Sri Lanka with India, especially Tamil Nadu says NIE.

There had been an air service between Palaly and Madras and Tiruchi, before the ethnic conflict turned the airport into a military base.

Addressing the media on the coalition government’s development agenda at the end of the second year in office, Prime Minister Wickremesinghe said that efforts to develop the Kankesanthurai harbor in Jaffna district to further develop communication links with South India will be discussed when the new Indian High Commissioner (Taranjit Singh Sandhu) assumes office.

On the current controversy surrounding the joint Indo-Lankan use of the 100 giant oil tanks in Trincomalee, he said that talks are on with the stakeholders concerned. The Lanka India Oil Corporation has been resisting efforts by the Ceylon Petroleum Corporation to develop some tanks unilaterally, bypassing the existing government to government agreement signed in 2002.